Some of the weeks incorporate both history and fiction, for example the reading of "A Man for All Seasons, " Robert Bolt's 1954 play -- later reworked into a famous 1966 film - about the life of Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor to England's mercurial King Henry VIII in the 16th century.

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To her surprise, the editor invited the 37-year-old housewife in for a meeting, and after reading samples of her writing later, gave her a job.

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But even later when my magazine reading went on line, for years in DC my go-to time-killer was to spend some time in a Borders flipping through graphic novels or books.

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Only later, this argument goes, did the sophisticated brain circuitry for reading gestures get rewired in humans to process speech.

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Ismaiel also tells his own story: of life in a remote village and hunger for reading, of student years in Teheran and political activism, and then later the acceptance of exile.

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